Fear and Blogging in EVEN I WOULDN'T COMPLETE THAT PUN

I put this blog off for a long time because, really, I was just scared. Whereas with screenwriting the learning process is hidden on my computer and in the minds of the few I have enough to share my work with, blog readers watch the evolution and hopefully positive development as it goes, for better and worse. I wrote that Barack Dubya piece today and when you write something like that you definitely get scared of the inevitable misunderstanding not to mention disapproval of your peers. "What if people don't like me?!" is essentially what's going on there. At least for me. One comment couldn't have been written better by my own insecurities. I won't say anymore about it so as not to seem like this whole post is a response (SEE, still scared about how stuff is interpreted), but point is, I SURVIVED! It wasn't as bad as I thought.

A therapist recommended to me a process in which when fear rears its head, instead of distracting myself with youtube or beating off or playing bass or whatever, I just sit there and bask in the fear and the feeling that a couple hundred million years of evolution have left me with. I usually feel it as a constriction in my chest, not sure how you would. Anyway, that exercise really helps me. I think of it like the burn in my lungs when I'm treadmilling or the burn in my upper legs after a couple hundred kicks in capoeira class. It hurts but when I'm doing that the goal of the pain is clear. If I can make myself more aware of the goal of facing my fears, it's easier to endure the pain, not to mention when the thing I'm afeared of actually goes down.

Here's a ferinstance--
I am terrrrribly afraid of rejection. I still get chills when I think about the time in ninth grade my hand got knocked off of a friends boob I went for -- how awesome is it that tits-before-lips was acceptable at brentwood school! Not too long ago, I had, I thought, hit it off with someone, and we were supposed to go out together so of course the fear showed itself (FUCK "reared its ugly head"). So, I did the little riding out the fear exercise. Anyway after a date I went in for a kiss I was all-but-sure would be reciprocated and, well, it wasn't. This sucked. Usually I'd have been horrified and spent days dwelling on the incident, but it actually was fine. Don't get me wrong. It stings. Still. And I certainly take it personally. But I'm fine and I don't think of it in the way I might have had I not acknowledged I was afraid and faced that shit before the fact. Worst part -- she could read this! GASP! But actually that's fine now that I'm learning to deal with this stuff. Again, it's not as if I'm cured of the fears, but it's starting to come under control and I'm more productive for it.

Anyway the point is I recommend this process to anyone who thinks it may be helpful. It's not easy but certainly worth a little ouch.